For those of you who use Ableton/PCDJ/Traktor to play out...

For those of you who use Ableton/PCDJ/Traktor to play out...

Just found this out today whilst reading through mixmag on my break at work:

You now need a PPL licence to play out using digital media (either tracks you've downloaded or ripped to a laptop, or tracks you've downloaded and burned to cd).

This licence costs £200 for a year

You have to pay this in advance and in full, in addition:

You need to keep the PPL informed as to what tracks are present in your library on your laptop/PC. You are permitted a maximum of 20,000 tracks on any device.

You need to tell the PPL where you work (as a DJ)

You need to prove that you have a PPL licence to the venue

And if you refuse to cooperate with a PPL inspector who wishes to see your equipment or licence they can request the presence of the police to make sure you cooperate :spangled:

You can't edit tracks you have bought - so swearing can not be edited out of rap songs, etc; the track can't be modified so 're-mixing' and 're-editing' of songs would be illegal.

Only 2 seconds are allowed to be used at the end of a track for mixing...

And to top it all off you are not permitted to record your mix.

Sounds a bit shit really? :fart:

If thats the kind of crap I'd have to put up with I'm not going to play with ableton outside of my bedroom.

Thing is...

The licence doesn't cover "illegally" downloaded music.

It's for legit downloads only (beatport, djdownload, hmv digital etc.)

Or CDs/Vinyl you already own and want to rip to MP3.

Fairly easy, most digital download services allow you to see what you've downloaded in web page form and it would be fairly easy to either print it out or show it to someone who asked. If they wanted to check the validity of individual tracks they can do that by checking the DRM information.

Thats what the 'digital library' system is aimed at, allowing the PPL to keep track of songs being played out and distributing royalties accordingly (and this I don't have a problem with), however:

Venues already pay royalties for tracks being played out to the PRS, who send random people out to PRS venues to obtain tracklists from DJs so they can allocate the royalties accordingly.

All this new licence does is discriminate against people who go digital (and I was certainly contemplating it with some of the new DJ gear I've got recently). However the new legislation now makes it illegal to burn MP3s that I've legally downloaded onto a CDR in DATA form and then shove them into my denon player and play them out to a crowd.

stupid

I suppose that you could argue that ableton is only playing certain sections of a track, so it doesn't count as 'editing'. It depends on your point of view. I'd imagine they'd probably argue that it's real-time editing or remixing of a song.

Aye....

Back to promos and whitediscs for me

There isn't mate... it's law now.

The whole thing is available to read on the ppl site.

The terms and conditions for the new licence, are here. To be honest they make depressing reading

Good to see the law keeping up with repetitive beat culture as usual.

I recall when radio 1 could not play tracks off the official pitch never mind mixing two records together.

I DJ (although admittedly all I play is commercial pap ). I've discovered over the last few months that it's easier (and cheaper) to hunt out the tracks I need for playing out by browsing the net and buying the tunes I like.

I've been able to get a hold of stuff that I couldn't normally get on CD (and in some rare cases, vinyl). I've started to diversify into new music that I probably would have never found and I've started burning the stuff onto CD so I can play it out.

I don't begrudge artists getting their money for their records being played (I agree with the idea of PRS licences for venues and I agree with paying a reasonable fee for a legal download). What I fail to see is why the licence for digital media lays the responsibility on the DJ, not on the venue. The only reasons I can think of is the money they can get out of it and the fact that venues would refuse to pay it.

If this becomes widespread then I can see it harming the industry more than helping it.

One of a few mate.

A PEL (Public Entertainment's Licence); Required whenever you have a venue that plays live music or music for the purposes of entertainment.

A PPL licence for the public playing of original sound recordings; e.g. CD's, tapes or records, including jukeboxes and background music systems and (since there was a change in the law from 31st October 2003) by means of radio or TV.

PRS licence - required for the live performance or public playing of copyright music by any means. This includes jukeboxes, CD's, video, radio, TV or live bands and discos.

Long and short of it:

PEL is payable to the council

PPL is payable to the record companies

PRS is payable to the artists.

Non enforceable rubbish.

It might apply to labels that are owned by the likes of Sony/EMI etc etc... But i seriously doubt that the music/labels that we listen to are signed up to this or even give a toss.

It's not really a question of whether the labels you play are subscribed to this or not... you still need it to play digital recordings of tracks unless you're playing your own productions.

I'd like to know what confuzzled or one of the legal bods on here makes of it though.